Mysteries
Large, damaged ancient Egyptian statue

Diagnosing the Dead

Distillations Article
Color illustration of a 19th-century cholera victim

John Snow Hunts the Blue Death

Distillations Article
Illustration of fairies around water

River Gods, Lake Monsters, and the Abiding Power of Myth

Distillations Article
Engraving of a woman making paper

Chasing the Clues in Isaac Newton’s Manuscripts

Distillations Article
Black and white photo of Sonny Boy the Woodpecker

The Death of the Lord God Bird

Distillations Podcast
Engraving of alchemist and royalty

Dr. Butler and the Quest for the Philosophers’ Stone

Distillations Article
Illustration of a large laser

The Undying Appeal of Nikola Tesla’s “Death Ray”

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Woodcut of medieval printers at work

Would a Book Lie?

Distillations Article
Black and white close up of vial under microscope

The Rise and Fall of Polywater

Distillations Article
Surrealist painting of artist drawing planet on canvas

How the First American Science Writer Found (Then Lost) God in the Cosmic Ray

Distillations Article
Illustration of rat climbing down a ship's mooring rope with a city in the distance

San Francisco’s Plague Years

Distillations Article
Silhouette of a vulture in front of a low sun.

Poison Pill: The Mysterious Die-Off of India’s Vultures

Distillations Article
Photo of Anton Chekhov with glasses and hat

The Death of Anton Chekhov, Told in Proteins

Distillations Article
Tollund Man

Bodies in the Bog: The Lindow Mysteries

Distillations Article
Science history photo collage

Love, Hate, and Sex from the History of Science

Distillations Podcast

Harry versus the Volcano

Distillations Article

Saving Old Movies

Distillations Article

Probing the Mysteries of Human Digestion

Distillations Article
caricature of a man blowing smoke out of his nostrils

If You Smell Something, Say Something

Distillations Article
Woman irritated by smog in LA in the 1950s

Fighting Smog in Los Angeles

Distillations Podcast
Man walking in forest of fall leaves

Whatever Happened to Acid Rain?

Distillations Podcast
Penguins on an iceberg

Whatever Happened to the Ozone Hole?

Distillations Podcast

A Study In Scarlet

Distillations Article
Laser inventor Gordon Gould playing chess 1940

The Man, the Myth, the Laser

Distillations Podcast

Stradivari and the Search for Brilliance

Distillations Article
Isaac Newton alchemical manuscript

Isaac Newton and the American Alchemist

Distillations Article
Susan Solomon in her NOAA office in Boulder, Colorado, next to a globe showing Antarctica.

Susan Solomon
Historical Profile
Richard Smalley with a model of a buckyball.

Richard E. Smalley, Robert F. Curl, and Harold W. Kroto
Historical Profile
Barnum & Bailey Poster

Strange Things

Distillations Article
A biologist at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) examines animal tissue, ca. 1970.

A Vulnerable Earth

Distillations Article
photo of whale with celestial background

Whales in Space

Distillations Article
A depiction of Jābir ibn Hayyan, after a 15th century portrait.

What’s in a Name?

Distillations Article
Clara Immerwahr

Casualty of War

Distillations Article
Illustration of factories on the Hudson River in New York City, 1870s

The Smell Detectives

Distillations Article
Cropped image of La Bella Principessa

The Da Vinci Question

Distillations Article